


Grissom

by shadoedseptmbr



Series: L'essai Et Repose [17]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Earthborn (Mass Effect), F/M, Grissom Academy mission, ME3, Overlord - Freeform, prior history
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:46:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26664652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadoedseptmbr/pseuds/shadoedseptmbr
Summary: swear jars
Relationships: David Anderson/Kahlee Sanders
Series: L'essai Et Repose [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1937545
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	Grissom

Traynor gets her info out and Shepard snaps at her, "Plug the coordinates in! Joker, get us there. Now!"  


“On it, Commander!”  


Her crew flies into action while Aedan leans against the rail of the CIC, as if she can make the Normandy fly faster with nothing but willpower for two reasons.  


David Archer...she can't let him slip back into Cerberus hands after all he went through. The tubes in his mouth still scrape the back of her throat in her nightmares, especially since Mars. Fucking Cerberus can't leave _anyone_ well enough alone. And she still needs to thank him. After all, he'd saved her, too.  


And the other is Kahlee. Anderson's Kahlee. She was why Aedan had even thought about Grissom for David.  


Stars blur around them, the drive kicks in as the relay shoots her back a dozen years.  


Kahlee, patiently going through grammar lessons with a barely literate punk scowling across a scrubbed aluminum diner table, picking at her nails. Kahlee laughing as Ace flies through another geometry proof. Kahlee, feeding her donuts and coffee and listening raptly as Shepard turns a memory into a coherent set of sentences and paragraphs.  


It had been Kahlee whose holo-perfect speech Shepard had mimicked those first few months at the Academy, practicing in a mirror the way she practiced Anderson's posture. She hasn't seen Sanders in _years_ now. But, once in a while, Anderson had mentioned her name in passing and lit up like an interface. Last time they talked before Alchera, he’d said he was on his way to Grissom where Kahlee was running some program for geniuses.  


Shepard hasn't heard from Anderson since Earth. She'll be damned if, _when_ , she sees him that she'll have to tell him that she lost his Kahlee.  


She doesn't have to. When they break into the little security station and she sees elegant, professorial Kahlee with a pistol in her hands, Shepard has to grin. Kahlee stutters over her name. She hadn't been Aedan, yet. Only barely been Shepard. Commander wasn't even a blip on anyone's ladar.  


But when Jack _oh, god. Jack. Three reasons. Thanks, Ashley._ swallows back a series of curses in front of her kids _oh, god. These kids like Kaidan. Ash, don't stop intervening now, yeah? I’ll light us some candles_ , Shepard has to sit down before her knees go out.  


Laughing as adrenaline bleeds out.  


A swear jar.  


Just like Kahlee had kept on the table between them. To buy the donuts, she'd said.


End file.
